time “acknowledge as his”; that, moreover, “Christian brethren, hitherto of unblemished reputation for soundness in the faith,” had differed as to the amount of error contained in the tracts, which were “written in such an ambiguous style” as to make the Ten shrink from the responsibility of giving a formal judgment; that the tracts were likely to be unintelligible to many in the congregation, and that there had seemed to be little probability that even the leaders would have come “to unity of judgment touching the nature of the doctrines therein embodied”.
Then followed the most fatal of all the clauses: “Supposing the author of the tracts were fundamentally heretical, this would not warrant us in rejecting those who came from under his teaching, until we were satisfied that they had understood and imbibed views essentially subversive of foundation-truth; especially as those meeting at Ebrington Street, Plymouth, last January, put forth a statement, disclaiming the errors charged against the tracts.”[1]
They objected strongly to being required to make the investigation, and felt that compliance “would be the introduction of an evil precedent. If a brother has a right to demand our examining a work of fifty pages, he may require our investigating error said to be contained in one of much larger dimensions.” The Letter concluded with a warning against “the evil of treating the subject of our Lord’s humanity as a matter of speculative or angry controversy”.
The Bethesda leaders afterwards stated that the letter was read to the Church with explanatory comments, without which, they maintained, it ought not to have been printed. They denied that the Letter was in
- ↑ See chap. vii., p. 141.
